I say, “To hell with it!”

 

I call this cozy and inviting.

To hell with minimalism, I'm saying. You can have it. Just be sure it's what you want.

 

Books and websites selling “the new minimalism,” often simply called “decluttering” and “simplifying,” like to tell us we can’t buy happiness. Let’s think about that. Okay. You can’t buy happiness, neither can I, but — think about this with me, please — I believe it's possible to throw happiness away and regret it later.

These things speak to me daily.

Follow the link here and look at the top image on this internet site. If that looks like a cozy, restful, snug and happy refuge from the world to you, read no further in my post today. On the other hand, if you are an inveterate hoarder — that’s another whole ball of wax — then you should go back to that link and follow the steps to clean up your act, because no one wants to have friends or family members living in absolute squalor. Hoarding is a sickness. Heal thyself!

 

Coming back from my digression, though, don’t we all know that hoarding vs. minimalism is a false dilemma? Collecting is not hoarding. And while most of us, I’m guessing, are not serious, committed collectors, with homes that could be mistaken for museums, neither are our homes junkyards, simply because we prefer more visual stimulation and activity than minimalism offers. 

Colorful tins, that's all.

Found objects

Little things

I bought him the box; he bought me the cow.

As for me, I look at bare, minimalist-“decorated” rooms and wonder if lives are being lived there at all. As I have written before on this blog, the Artist and I together were never minimalists. Our life together was rich, although that life, as well as the one I have now, could well be called a simple life. “Too many books”? To me, that sounds like “too much art,” i.e., an oxymoron of the first order. 

Yes to books!

Yes to art!

When my sisters and I had to clear out our mother’s house, we did think she had “too many clothes,” it's true, but none of us were sorry she had kept boxes of photographs, letters, and other personal mementoes, some of which we had never seen before. I wrote about that and about how much it meant to see a scrapbook my mother had started back when she and our father had their first date. 

 

I have saved old letters myself, and along with several albums of photographs I also have piles of loose photos, as did the Artist – and I am keeping all of his, along with my own. He loved his memories, and I love mine, and we shared many wonderful years. Why would I “declutter” my life by throwing out reminders of happiness when I can, through those reminders, re-live more youthful times, our years together, as well as years before we met? 

A little messy but full of life!

Paintings, prints, and photographs on the wall; books on the shelves; a beautiful, “useless” vase; perfectly shaped bowls; little collections of tins and boxes; a row of cowboy boots here and hats hung there; even the ubiquitous scattering of stones on a windowsill that all northern Michigan people seem to have (is that “in our DNA,” as people are so fond of saying nowadays?) – my surroundings are brimming with associations that tell me in a thousand ways of the richness of my life. 

Mine (need polishing)

His --

“Declutter”? You first! What happiness is left to me, I will not be so foolish as to throw away, and I can imagine people today falling for the minimalism fad and wondering on some tomorrow years from now whatever possessed them. “I’d give anything if only I still had my mother’s high school ring ... my father's letters ... that sketchbook from our trip to Paris!” 

Obligatory photo of Sunny Juliet!

My Beautiful Things

Male peacock at Holy Trinity Monastery, St. David, AZ

Years ago, the first time I ever visited a U.P. friend in her house, I came back out, bubbling over with enthusiasm, to the car where the Artist had waited. “She has rocks everywhere, hand-made quilts — books, of course — even a wasp’s nest!” He asked, “Does she have objets de vertu?” The phrase was French but not familiar to me, and I asked what it meant. “Beautiful things,” he told me. I was taken aback (why was he even asking?) and protested, “I already told you she has a wasp’s nest!” 

My Upper Peninsula friend had a kitchen full of her home-canning projects and a living room overflowing with books. Out on her porch were numerous wind chimes. She had chickens! I found her world enchanting, chickens included, because just as Amy March envied girls with nice noses, I always envy girls and women with horses and/or chickens. Chickens, whether beautiful or not (and chickens do vary in looks), all make those lovely, soothing, soft clucking sounds. And my grandmother had chickens, so there’s that, too.

Male in full display mode

I’ve never yearned for peacocks, but we enjoy seeing them at Holy Trinity Monastery south of St. David, and the males were in full display on our last visit, where we lingered to watch them. If only this male had displayed against some background other than green shrubbery! Well, the monastery is always a peaceful place, as it should be, away from the larger world’s hustle and bustle. — Not that our ghost town winter is characterized by hustle and bustle, except for bombardments of daily news, and even those are easily left behind, simply by walking out the door and into the quiet desert. 

Peahens are beautiful, too, in their quieter way.

But birds, lovely though they be, are leading me away from my subject -- the one I have not even begun to address -- which is: my own beautiful things. 

Cheap, modest beauty

Things I buy for myself are rarely new or expensive, particularly during my winter seasonal retirement, when five dollars on a non-necessity is a splurge that comes straight out of the grocery budget. I have to think very carefully before taking the plunge. Crucial question: Is this something that will give me lasting pleasure? Last year I splurged on an unframed painting at an estate sale, something I still look at often and enjoy, and the latest self-indulgence this year is another painting, this one a complicated Chinese scene from the past, appearing to represent an important dignitary arriving by horseback (in a village, perhaps?), preceded by an entourage to announce his arrival. I particularly like the little black dog cavorting in the background at the upper left. I like the touch of whimsy and the real-world feeling that little dog adds to the scene.

Not one of those subtle, understated and exquisite nature studies from a Japanese master, still this work charms me and will, I’m sure, continue to do so. In the same vein, I recently bought four small Navajo sand paintings, their artists identified by name and photo on the backs. These, of course, have spiritual significance, as well as aesthetic excellence, and they could not be more at home here in Arizona, so how could I resist? 

(Fourth is over my desk.)

And with the newly acquired Chinese and Navajo works, the walls of my little reading and writing corner are full, so now, shelves full of books (beautiful to me), writing tablets stacked on the desk, ephemera and mementoes tucked into the frame of the mirror, art on the walls, boots (when I’m not wearing them) propped in the corner between bookshelves (one pair) and (the other) perched high above, the entire corner gives joy to my soul. All of these are material objects. All beautiful to me, each adds to my happiness and contentment, and I love them in ensemble, both night and day.